I guess your riding season is the opposite of most of us, unless you go on a road trip. Here in Albuquerque we're blessed with around 300 days of sunny weather a year, and not too hot in the summer. The 5,300 ft elevation helps!
The Speed is looking great, Sandi. What a fantastic option if you don’t fancy riding one of your Harleys.
Sunday ride with my usual group , mostly BMW riders, on the way back one of them who is considering trading his R1250GS for the new 1300 offered to trade bikes .. so I ended up riding a 1250GS on a twisty road I know quite well How did I find the GS vs my Tiger 900 ? The boxer engine felt smoother Riding at the usual pace felt absolutely effortless The seat is wider more comfortable Seat height was about the same , perhaps just a bit higher Weight while riding slow: I felt no difference Love the clutch, it is light and progressive, makes it easy to feel the gray zone Brakes are more powerful Engine is also more powerful but sensations were not as different as the numbers suggest Quick shifter is ROUGH Wind protection is better Suspension felt very similar to the tiger The GS was on Dynamic Pro setting Foot pegs on the GS are higher so my knees are more bent than on the Tiger The GS is very responsive to course corrections, ie: avoiding a pothole Once turning it feels very stable , but somehow like a remote control , hard to explain It was a positive experience and reaffirms the Tiger is a great choice for me, having a bigger engine will just tempt me to ride faster and I'm trying not to, specially since the GS that does not transmit any emotion at my usual riding pace, I found it almost boring.
Sandi Such a sharp looking speed triple ! Is it hard to adjust your riding between the harleys and this ? The weather looked great , 80F is the ideal temp in my book
Thanks, Armando! I really like my Speed Triple RS a lot. I find it’s not that difficult to adapt among my three motorcycles. But if I haven’t ridden one or two of them for a while, I do notice it feels a little strange. When I got my most recent Harley, the Low Rider ST, I rode that bike a lot for about three weeks and my other bikes not at all. Then when I rode my other two bikes, independent of brand, they both felt a bit foreign. But it only took 10 or 20 miles until both of them felt completely comfortable to me again. I actually like riding multiple bikes and feel like somehow it makes me a more competent and confident rider.
The hard part @Armando Morales about swapping bikes is if you have a modern bike, say Jap or Triumph, plus at least one other older british bike, say again a Triumph. With the gears and rear brake reversed, issues are easily created. My mates dad smashed into a slowing down Range Rover pushing the back window in with his helmet/head after swapping from his classic Triumph (T5?) to his Moto Guzzi. Pressing heavily on the gearlever and hanging on for dear life doesn't have the same deceleration effect as the brake pedal This resulted in a hospital visit with a broken tibia, which, when your in your 70's, isn't a good idea.
Well I have done absolutely nothing regarding my Triumph since the ride out over a week ago, it has been stuck in my garage since then and I am unable to get it out to either ride it or clean it, scaffolding is blocking access, so it will have to stop as it is for the foreseeable I guess.
Fitted a Triboseat anti slip cover for the pillion part of my Tiger 1050 seat after complaints from the better half
Not today but yesterday. I took my tiger to get a winter treatment based on ACF50. Brilliant job done by Barrie from Premier Motorcycle Care. Here are a few pictures on the process and the final result. I think the bike looked better than the day I rode it from the dealers.
Like the "white out" pics Steve, it looks very ghostly, a bit like those films you see of old sailing ships appearing out of the fog crewed by ghost pirates jim lad, ah ahh.
Helmut and I went on a nice ride to the Baffle Haus https://www.baffleculture.com/bafflehaus and back today - Street Triple and Multistrada. The weather was a bit on the showery side but not too bad; it was just lovely to be out enjoying the bikes after the weather of the past week or so .
Added lights to the panniers (running, brake, flashing turn indicator); added a light bar to the top of the license plate (running, brake, progressive amber turn, deceleration sensor, license plate light); added some reflective tape and stickers to the boxes and the wheel rims. Future project will be putting lights behind the reflectors in the top box. This week it goes in for the 600-mile service and will also get the fog lights, heated grips, and quickshifter installed, that weren't available at bike pick up time! Running lights, light bar currently set at 20%, may up it to 40% Left turn Brakes, before adding the light bar Reflective tape, no flash Reflective tape with flash, doesn't do it justice - once the sun goes down and car headlights shine on the bike from the side, it looks like Tron wheels and lines!
That certainly lights up the rear of the bike. Do you run with the top box and panniers on all the time and do you have plugs so you can take them on and off? Cheers
Still in the break-in period and have only really been commuting or running errands, so yes the boxes have stayed on so far. If I'm not carrying my work bag or planning on picking up supplies then the top box will likely come off first. I keep waterproof gear in one side and my tool bag in the other, so they'll likely stay on most of the time. The connectors are 1/4 turn weatherproof bulkheads though, so I can quickly disconnect and remove them.
Following my putting the Thruxton in its vacsac over the weekend, I today SORN’d it. Whilst I was looking for the v5 I noticed the MOT has run out on the 17th of October. I have not ridden it for the past few weeks, so lucky me lol. Won’t bother to MOT it until next year when it comes out of hibernation for the riding season.
Wow, @Wessa! What a process. Your bike looks fantastic, like it spent a day at the spa. Which I guess it sort of did. How expensive was it? Whatever they charged, I'd sway from the photos that it's worth it!
While from others' posts it sounds like the winterization process is looming for many of you, for those of us in Arizona we are just hoping to be kissing those 100ºF+ temperatures goodbye! Last week Tucson set an all-time record for the latest date in the year that the thermometer hit 100ºF. Fortunately for Steve and me, we were out of town last week in a completely different setting than our Sonoran Desert. We were on the Caribbean island of Cozumel, Mexico for a scuba trip. Also fortunately for Steve and me, now that we're back home the temperatures are much cooler with daytime highs around 80ºF. And today we had a torrential downpour much of the afternoon! Of course that's because I washed my car before we departed on our trip. That all said, I'm not trying to derail this thread with weather and travel reports. But I just wanted to say that there's nothing like being back home after traveling and still having a couple of days off----to ride! We got home Saturday night and I was back at work today so tthat left me Sunday and Monday to ride. And that's what I did. Laundry can wait. Yesterday (Monday) I rode my Speed Triple to coffee with a ride buddy and we took the long(ish) way 'round. Speedy was happy to be out and so was I. The high was about 82ºF which feels about 10º cooler here in the dry desert. I did choose to wear my mesh summer riding jacket but I think it's about time to pull out the leather jackets now. Finally! I don't have any photos to document the day so you'll just have to trust me. However, here's a map of our route. My riding buddy, Russell, along with his wife, Shelly, had accompanied us on our Cozumel trip last week and he was about as antsy as me to get some riding in after having been bike-less on an island for a week. Monday's ride was about 50 miles. The previous day (Sunday) I rode my Harley Street Glide with Russell and one other riding buddy. Our Cozumel contingent had arrived home from Cozumel the night before around 9pm after quite a long travel day. But even though I was tired, I was very eager to get out for a ride, and so was Russell. I'd not set up our usual Sunday group ride so it was just the three of us this morning for breakfast at the Sunny Side Up Cafe in the town of Catalina. Our buddy had to head home after breakfast for some "honey do's" but Russell and I wanted to ride more so we continued on up to Mammoth where we sat on the patio drinking a soda at Mi Pueblito. Again, no photos but here's a Google map of our route. Sunday's ride was 95 miles. The rides both days were wonderful -- very temperate and not too windy. I found myself counting my blessings as we rode. On Friday morning I was under the beautiful blue Caribbean sea swimming with the fishies doing my other favorite hobby, diving, And only a couple of days later, here I was, riding through my beloved Sonoran Desert!
Yes, it’s always good to get home, in particular to your own bed @Sandi T . Great that you had an opportunity to ride after your trip, always good therapy. The treatment was £80 and yes I think great value.
